CS:GO Championship Series Season 3 Finals Preview

20 June 2017 09:54

Eight teams will contest the Championship Series 3 Finals this weekend, all eager to be crowned champions and awarded $250,000 of the $660,000 prize pool at Wembley Arena, London. Teams will fight it out from Friday 23rd to Sunday 25th June playing the Cache, Cobblestone, Inferno, Mirage, Nuke, Overpass and Train maps.

Qualification

The teams have reached the Season 3 finals following a rigorous qualification process from their respective regions – four apiece from Europe and North America - where each team fought it out in round robin, best-of-one matches.

FaZe, Astralis, G2 Esports and Fnatic made it through the European league, staving off the challenge from Ninjas in Pyjamas, Team EnVyUs, mousesports, GODSENT, Virtus.pro and Team Dignitas.

In the North American region, Cloud 9, SK Gaming, Team Liquid and OpTic Gaming progressed through to the Season 3 finals, finishing ahead of Counter Logic Gaming, Immortals, NRG Esports, Renegades, Luminsoity Gaming and Ghost Gaming. Cloud9 and SK Gaming both finished joint top-of-the-table on 39 points with a 13-5 record, but the former, led by Jake "Stewie2k" Yip, took first place with a higher round difference of +75 from 251-176. Along with Jordan "n0thing" Gilbert, Mike "shroud" Grzesiek, Tyler "Skadoodle" Latham and Timothy "autimatic" Ta, Cloud9 will be looking to carry that impressive form to the UK capital.

The Groups

The Season 3 finals will see a group stage leading into best-of-three single elimination bracket play-offs, and the European and North American sides have been mixed up into the following groups. The odds on winning the finals outright are provided by Bet365:

Group A

FaZe – 4/1

G2 Esports - 4/1

SK Gaming – 4/1

OpTic Gaming – 50/1

Group B

Fnatic – 6/1

Astralis – 9/4

Team Liquid – 16/1

Cloud9 – 25/1

Who Will Be Crowned Season 3 Champions?

The opening games of Group A sees FaZe face OpTic Gaming and G2 Esports take on SK Gaming, whilst Cloud 9 come up against fnatic, and Team Liquid oppose Astralis in Group B. A Group A side is 4/6 to go all the way, whilst a Group B team is fancied at 11/10 to take home the $250,000. Astralis were triumphant in Season 2 in December 2016, taking home the winners’ share of the prize pool after beating OpTic Gaming 2-0 in the grand final. Their victory came after a 16-6 win in the Overpass map, and a 16-11 victory in the Train map. Peter 'dupreeh' Rasmussen contributed the most kills (42), most damage (85.8) and most first kills (8) in that final, and the 24-year-old will be key to Astralis’s success in Season 3. One of the pre-tournament favourites will undoubtedly be looking to progress from Group B once again, and put in a repeat performance this time around.

Group A contains Season 1 winners G2 Esports, who came from 2nd place in the group stage to win in June 2016. Their 2-0 grand final victory over Luminosity came with 16-11 and 16-5 victories in the Dust1 and Overpass maps. Adil 'ScreaM' Benrlitom provided the most kills that days (26) and most first kills (4), and the Belgian will be hoping for a repeat performance two years after playing such an integral role in securing victory for his side. Benriltom will be competing in London alongside teammates Cédric "RpK" Guipouy, Richard "shox" Papillon, Edouard "SmithZz" Dubourdeaux and Alexandre "bodyy" Pianaro.

Prize Pool

A European side is 2/9 odds on to emerge victorious in Season 3, whilst a North American side is 3/1 to upset the odds and take home the title. The prize pool is below:

1st place - $250,000

2nd place – $120,000

3rd place - $65,000

4th place - $65,000

5th place - $45,000

6th place - $45,000

7th place - $35,000

8th place - $35,000

All these sides have already received direct invites to Season 4, but before then, they’ll be desperate to be crowned CS:GO Season 3 champions this weekend.